Organization: Rural China Education Foundation

All Photos Our mission is to promote education in rural China that empowers students to improve their lives and their communities. We believe rural students should develop skills and confidence from their education that will help them deal with real world problems, deepen their understanding of social issues, and prepare them to make positive changes in their local environments.

Focus Areas:	Children, Education, Poverty
Countries Served:	China

Description of Services:
Our strategy is to accumulate and share practice-based expertise on teaching methods that make rural education more relevant to rural students' lives, more well-rounded, and more enjoyable. We network and support rural educators to experiment with and document effective curricula and teaching approaches for the rural context. We also support library and reading programs in our partner schools and support other schools and organizations to implement innovative teaching projects.
History:
RCEF was born in the fall of 2004 when a group of overseas Chinese scholars at the Dragon 100 conference got together because of their common interest in researching and supporting rural education in China. From 2005 to 2007, RCEF started a number of new programs such as supporting rural education projects of small grassroots organizations and setting up several rural school and community libraries. These programs were mainly started in response to the needs and requests of rural schools and to opportunities to collaborate with other organizations. During this period, we learned a lot about the problems and needs in rural education which have led RCEF to its current strategy and work.
Accomplishments & Progress:
1. Integrative Rural Education Program: Based in Guan'Ai school, this platform of 200 students supports full-time rural teachers to experiment with and document effective curricula and teaching approaches for the rural context. 2. Summer Volunteer Program: Since 2005, 120 RCEF volunteers have put on 14 innovative summer camps reaching around 1000 children to supplement and enrich their rural village education. 3. Innovation Grants Program: RCEF has the only small grant competition in China for grassroots rural education projects. We have funded 13 projects to date. 4. Library and Reading Program: RCEF has set up 6 school and community libraries and is working to develop methods to foster a life-long love of learning.